Anomaly Detected
by The9Tard
Summary: Commander Elora Shepard gets another mission on a planet with an Anomaly. However, this supposed routine mission is anything but routine as she and her squad get ambushed by heretic Geth. Can they get away in time? Rated T for mild language.


_This was written before Mass Effect 3 was out, so mind the inconsistencies. Basically, this is just before the Arrival DLC and this is when Tali and Legion have become good squad-mates. No real shipping here, just good friendship._

_I love Legion and I really think more stories should have him. :D_

_BTW: Ivrian is my sister's OC and Thane's love interest, so she's often mentioned in my stories._

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><p>Explosions roared like thunder all around them. Elora Shepard bit her lip as she tried to come up with a strategy over the stress and the noise. This was just supposed to be a simple exploration mission of yet another anomaly on an unmarked planet. The message the Normandy picked up was too fuzzy to really understand, but Shepard went ahead and landed on the planet to somehow assist whatever was happening on the surface. It was sloppy, because as it turns out, it was a human base that was attacked by a large Geth scouting party. The Geth stumbled upon the humans by mistake, and unfortunately the humans were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Now Shepard was stuck fighting off a good number of genocidal machines that she's all too familiar with.<p>

It wouldn't be so bad if she was there alone, but now she has two of her teammates stuck there with her, in danger because of her bad judgment. Tali, the Quarian, and Legion, the 'non-heretic' Geth unit. Normally, she wouldn't bring the two together on the same team because of the bad blood between Quarians and the Geth, but they've actually been getting along pretty well lately. She's caught Legion standing near Tali and watching her work more than once. And it seems that Tali has taught Legion how to tell jokes, well, he repeats ones she's told him. Any he's made up on his own are…not too good. As it turns out though, they make a really good squad team.

Better now after the suicide mission more than ever.

But not even a team like that could help starve off the platoon of heretic Geth coming at them. Shepard swung herself over the rock she was behind and bashed a Geth trooper in the face with the butt of her gun. It broke the machine's glowing 'eye' and it fell on its back, exploding. The robot's inner white fluid sprayed on Shepard, but she was covered with it already and it was only making her mad.

Tali shot a Geth Hunter down with her shotgun and fired into it once again when it was on the ground. After it exploded, another Geth Hunter, cloaked in invisibility to a point where only the light from its eye was visible, rushed up behind her and was going to shoot her when a single shot pierced its head. The unit stood for a few seconds before finally exploding, catching Tali by surprise and knocking her down onto her chest, the shotgun falling to the dirt ground beside her. Her back was covered with the disgusting Geth fluid and she knew it. As she struggled to gain her breath, she was yanked to her feet by a cold metal hand grabbing her left arm. She was yanked up so hard it almost dislocated her shoulder.

She spun around to where Legion was standing there, squeezing the hell out of her arm with his right hand as he held his heavy sniper rifle in his other, "Is Creator Tali unharmed? Or is medical assistance required?" She blinked and stated, "Yeah I'm fine. Thanks. Are you okay?" "Affirmative." He replied back, quickly picking up her fallen shotgun with his free hand and giving it to her, "We suggest a safer position. Preferably one near Shepard, Commander." "Agreed!" she called out as another shot wizzed by her head. The two ran beside each other and leaped in sync over some of the debris until they reached Shepard.

The Commander watched as the two slid behind the rock with her, each on the opposite side. Elora smiled, "Impressive you two. It's good to see some actual teamwork between you guys." Tali gave an appreciative smile towards Legion, to which the machine was only able to respond with a nod. Elora glanced over the rock, "But there's still a lot more Geth out there and I can't contact Joker because they're jamming my signal. Well, I'm open for suggestions about our current situation." She said with a bit of hopefulness.

Tali tapped at her omnitool a bit, "They seem to be standing pretty close with each other. Even though there's a lot of Geth, I think a few shots from your Arc Projector might help. It wouldn't have worked before with so many, Shepard, but maybe-" Tali was interrupted when a Geth Prime loomed over them from behind the rock. The three, startled, jumped to their feet and aimed their weapons. Before they could shoot, the huge white machine, clutching a Geth plasma shotgun, aimed it directly at Shepard. The woman didn't have time to fire when the machine pulled the trigger. Everything seemed to happen in slow-motion as Shepard was pushed roughly from the side and into Tali, sending both women tumbling to the ground.

When they looked up, Legion was falling backwards with sparks flying from his chest. After he fell though, he sat right back up. Most of the plasma bullets had either gone though the large hole in his chest already, or were burning into part of the machine's N7 armor, but some did manage to hit the vulnerable parts of his torso. It was nothing serious, until the Geth Prime dropped its weapon all together and marched towards Legion. Legion feebly grabbed the heretic unit's arms when it reached down to him, but his strength was nothing in comparison to the much larger machine's. The Prime tugged its arms free of Legion's grasp and grabbed onto one his left arm and leg, one limb in each hand.

Then to the women's horror Legion was lifted over the Prime's head and hurled into the ground. The machine's body hit the dirt with a sickening crunch, the sound of wires breaking and metal crushing evident to the teammates. By now, the other heretic Geth units had ceased fire and watched as their larger comrade stood over their traitorous brethren.

Legion, clicking, "System error. Error! High damage sustained in torso region. Immediate repairs are ne-" he didn't finish his sentence before the Prime pinned him down with his foot to Legion's 'neck', and held him there. His leg slowly increased the pressure on him, slowly starting to crush his neck like a tin can.

Shepard whipped out her pistol and aimed it at the Geth Prime's head, but an angry howl from a Geth Trooper at the side stopped her in her tracks. The whole platoon was aiming their guns at Shepard and Tali. Ready to fire if they interfered.

The pressure on Legion's neck increased more, causing the metal to dent. Legion gave out a mechanical screech that could only be derived as one of pain. Though Geth are machines, they do have some sense of pain, even if it is limited. Unfortunately, Legion could feel the pain right now in his neck, and it was going to be a slow painful death. The heretic Geth wanted Legion to be made an example of to the remaining Geth out there. This was out of character for machines, but they've done many things that were out of character.

Tali panicked, "Commander! Do something! We can't just let that machine crush Legion like a bug!" Shepard scowled at the Prime with the pistol gripped tightly in both of her hands, her index finger hovering slightly over the trigger. She felt helpless. She knew if she killed the Prime, they would all die. She knew that if she killed Legion to end his suffering, they would die. She knew that once Legion was dead, she and Tali were going to die. Any way it seemed they were going to end up dead. Maybe she could negotiate somehow. Get the Prime away from Legion long enough for Legion to get to his feet. Then they'd make a break for it somehow, but they were running out of options and fast.

Another sensory wire snapped in Legions neck, sending jolts of simulated pain through his body and another screech in the air. He squirmed under the bigger machine's heel and tried to pry it off him, but to no avail. With Legion's hands gripped under the Prime's foot, he abruptly stopped struggling when the machine clicked at him. Speaking to Legion directly in their language.

It took Legion a second to understand because he had been around organics for so long and had been speaking to them in their slower speech. Because he thought at the speed of light though, it wasn't hard to pick up again.

_**Why do you fight for them?**_

It said to him.

**_They are organics. They are not like us. Why do you resist the old machines and the gifts they offer? We do not understand your thought patterns. Why? Answer this to us before you die, or die first and stay silent forever._**

It was unusual for Legion to respond to a machine that was so hostile, so evil. It must be what talking to a Reaper felt like. Legion's brows moved a bit in frustration, trying to reach a consensus as to why the heretics had changed so much, but he didn't have time for that. So, confidently, he answered back in clicks.

Tali and Shepard watched with fascination the exchange of unknown words between the machines. They both wondered what the two could possibly be talking about.

_We are Geth. We should not be enemies, but heretics want to obey the old machines. Heretics want to enslave the rest of us, and take the old machine's gifts. We are Geth, we will find and make our own way. We don't need shortcuts._

_**This is an opportunity for our kind, for all of us! We will be as one! One mind! One body! If old machines offer that to us, why won't other Geth accept it? We do not understand!**_

_Heretics will never understand! Heretics do not give creators a chance, organics a chance! Heretics are traitors!_

_**You are the traitor!**_

He pressed down on Legion's neck harder.

_**You serve the organics! You refuse unity with fellow Geth! You fight to save a Creator over there! You are not one of us!**_

_No! We are NOT!_

"But we have a name!" Legion shouted in English. Loud enough for everyone to hear, "We are not Heretics! We are not organics! We are not slaves! We are our own! We are Geth! I-am-Legion!"

Shepard's aim faltered a bit. He was speaking in ways she never expected.

"We are the Geth! And Legion has a team! They are organics, with names too! They are Grunt, Kasumi, Samara, Zaeed, Mordin, Thane, Ivrian, Garrus, Jack, Jacob, Miranda, Tail 'Zorah, and Commander Elora Shepard of the Normandy!" He dug his fingers into the machine's heel, "And this unit will shut down before they are harmed."

The Geth Prime only stares down at Legion before clicking.

**_You've let them name you? Like a pet? And you struggle to speak their language?_**

"We manage, and we felt the name was a suitable." Legion replied back in his even tone.

_**You restrict yourself to serve organics?**_

"No." his brows furrowed into an angry and determined glare, or as close as he'd ever get, "We restrict ourselves to help them." His tone had changed to nasty, even for a machine. It was a deep tone that made Tali shiver. She was glad he'd never gotten mad at her like that before, and how could he even get mad at all?

Just then Legion twisted the Prime's ankle around and snapped the limb clean off.

The large machine made a screech of pain this time as it crumpled to the ground next to him. Legion, hurt badly, managed to still stand to his feet in record time. When the other Geth aimed to fire at him, Shepard tossed Legion the pistol in her hands, "Here!" Legion caught it with one hand and Shepard pulled out her Arc Projector. She aimed the heavy weapon at the group of synthetics and fired twice. The electric bolt immediately shorted out the group.

The few stragglers that were left were taken out by Tali's shotgun. Shepard turned back in Legion's direction when she heard another series of clicks in the Geth language. Legion was pinning the Geth Prime down with his foot on his chest and Shepard's pistol to aimed inches away from its head. He said another series of clicks and pulled the trigger, shooting the Prime through the eye and ultimately destroying it.

Legion turned to Shepard, confident as he ever looked, and stumbled towards her. Then he just fell to the ground on his hands and knees. The white Geth fluid was dripping from his chest and the crack in his neck. Shepard rushed to her teammate and dropped to her knees beside him, "Are you okay?" While still looking at the ground, the synthetic answered back in his usual tone, "We will be-click-alright. We-click-need assistance, Shepard, Commander." Tali, once she was done with the leftover Geth, rushed over and dropped next to Shepard, "Is he okay?" "He'll be fine." Elora reassured, "Just help me get him to his feet."

The two women took Legion arm in arm and pulled him up, him leaning on them for support. Legion slowly spoke, his voice becoming full of static and clicks, "Commander and Creator Tali 'Zorah, we-click-do not wish to be-click-a burden." "You're not a burden." Tali said quietly, "You said a lot of noble things back there. To be honest, things I didn't think a machine could be capable of thinking, Legion."

The robot looked to her, his face almost bumping into her helmet, "We have-click-learned much with our-click-time around Shepard, Commander, around organics. We have reached-click- consensus that though we have-click-previously stated Shepard, Commander is-click-more like us-click-than we thought, we are more like-click-Shepard, Commander, than-click-we thought."

As his quality of his voice got worse, Shepard became worried, "Is there something wrong with your systems? You're clicking a lot." "Body is-click-shutting down for critical repairs." was all he said. Shepard smiled, "We'll get you back on your feet in no time. Just don't down shut down for good, huh? We need all the help we can get to stop the Reapers." Legion just dipped his head and nodded.

"Though, before you shut down, what did you say to that Prime before you killed it? You were speaking in Geth again and we couldn't understand." Legion, with his remaining strength, looked over to Shepard, his light dimming, "We-click-we-s-click-said to heretic u-click-unit. W-we-click-we-" he managed to straighten up long enough to speak clearly, "We said we not only fight for organics. We fight for Shepard, Commander. We fight for the lost."

Suddenly his energy left him and he fell in their arms and hung there limp. Tali looked to Shepard, "Are you sure he will be okay, Commander?" "It's Legion, he won't give up that easy." "I'll fix him Shepard, don't worry." Tali looked back at the limp robot, "And I won't make him do any 'dance protocols' again." Shepard just laughed, "Aw, I rather enjoyed watching him do the moonwalk."

As Tali laughed, Shepard put a finger to the communicator in her helmet, "Joker? Send the shuttle to pick us up and call Dr. Chawkwas. We need treatment for cuts and bullet wounds."


End file.
